“It’s dark as pitch,” he heard a voice say. “But I’ll get a light. The kids are all asleep long ago. Bill, you make for the stairway and switch on the lights. We want to get out of this as soon as we can.”
There was a grunted response to this, and the boys could hear the man called Bill tip-toeing toward the stairway. Pod and Fleet had heard the conversation, and knowing that they were prepared to act, when he heard the footfalls of the man, Bill, on the bottom step, Tom called quickly:
“Lights!”
Pod snapped the button, and instantly the basement was flooded with a yellow glow.
“Hands up!” cried the three boys in unison, as they covered the three men who appeared before them. The fourth man had been only partly through the trap-door when the lights came on, and he dropped quickly back, pulling the trap shut behind him.
Pod found himself covering the burly Bill, who had paused with one foot on the steps. Fleet took the man nearest him, evidently the leader of the little party, and Tom covered the other man who was near the trap-door, and not more than four feet away from him.
For a few seconds, following the command of the boys, there was complete silence. It was broken by a laugh from the man whom Fleet was covering.
“Well, it looks like you’d made a good haul this time, kids,” he said. “Just what can we do for you?”
“Stand right still until we tell you to move,” said Fleet.
“This is a nice mess!” growled the fellow called Bill.